COLUMBIA, S.C. - Gov. Mark Sanford will again ask the Legislature to combine a handful of state agencies and eliminate elections for several statewide elected officers.

Sanford said in a statement Thursday the state could save $3.4 million in the budget he'll offer to the Legislature in January on top of the $15.6 million in health care and restructuring changes he previously suggested.

The governor wants the Department of Health and Environmental Control, Department of Natural Resources and the Forestry Commission combined into a new Cabinet-level Department of Environment and Natural Resources. He also wants two of his Cabinet agencies, Department of Corrections and the Probation and Parole Department consolidated into a single agency.

And he would roll the state Archives and History Department, Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of South Carolina, Arts Commission, State Library and State Museum into a new Department of Literary and Cultural Resources.

Sanford, out of town for Air Force Reserve training, also wants joint-ticket elections in the future for governors and lieutenant governors and to let future governors appoint the state's education superintendent, agriculture commissioner, secretary of state and adjutant general, Sanford spokesman Joel Sawyer said.

That requires a change in the state Constitution voters would have to approve. If they did, the governor in office in 2011 would make those appointments.

That would leave voters to choose the governor-lieutenant governor ticket, treasurer, comptroller general and attorney general on the statewide ballot, Sawyer said.